The Portable Charles Lamb (The Viking Portable Library, 43)

x, 594 pp. The perennially delightful Elia is strikingly self-portrayed through a generous selection of his letters, and a new and startingly original arrangement of his essays so contrived as to reveal more clearly than ever before the characteristics of the man, his work, and his interests. John Mason Brown's witty introduction is a feeling character appreciation in a style and mood that Lamb himself might well have employed.--rear jacket panel